REL-NET · Entangled Interfaith Identities and Relations from the Mediterranean to the United States: The St James Association and Its Transnational Christian-Jewish Network in the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict

Mixed religious identities and interfaith relations represent one of the most crucial and debated phenomena in the 21st century. The revival of the religious dimension in the world is evident in the growing religious implications in modern and contemporary wars. The REL-NET project tackles these global issues through the analysis of a significant case study that has been overlooked in the historiography: the history of Christian–Jewish transnational networks between Israel, Palestine, the Middle East, Europe and the United States after the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948. In particular, I will focus on the history of the St James Association (SJA) since the end of the 1940s. The SJA is a community formed by Holocaust survivors who converted to Christianity, moved to Israel and settled in the mainly Arab Jerusalem Church. Some SJA members became well-known intellectuals who developed an international network that influenced Christian–Jewish–Muslim relations during the Israeli–Palestinian conflict and on a global scale. Using multiple and interdisciplinary methodologies and an unprecedented mass of unpublished archival documentation disseminated all over the world will lead me to retrace the strands that contributed to the new relations between Jews and Christians while also engaging Muslim communities. Involving an extensive programme of teaching, language, digital and project management training at Fordham and Ca’ Foscari universities and under the supervision of two leading scholars in these fields, the MSCA-GF will give me the extraordinary opportunity to outline a new framework for the historical appraisal of religious relationships in the contemporary world, delivering innovative outputs in terms of academic products and in disseminating them to a larger and non-specialist audience and significantly advancing my already solid experience within European research programmes (ERC and ERASMUS), which will decisively enhance my academic career.